Chapter 3: The Holloways Watch
Beatrice Holloway polished the same spot on a 19th-century brass barometer for the third time, her gaze not on the tarnished metal but on the window. Across the cobblestone street, a neon sign buzzed to life, painting the gathering dusk in violent pink strokes: Sweet Peppers.
“It’s good for the street, Bea. New foot traffic.” Margot said, arranging a collection of art deco ashtrays. Her voice was soft, hopeful. “Maybe they’ll wander in after getting a cookie.”
“They aren’t wandering. They’re beelining.” Bea’s knuckles were white around the rag. “And they’re not coming out the same.”
It had been seventy-two hours. A steady, murmuring stream of women, from college-aged to middle-aged, drawn like moths to that garish glow. They went in looking normal—laughing, texting, stressed, bored. They came out…
“Look,” Bea whispered.
A cluster of five young women pushed through the bakery’s door. They moved as a single, uncoordinated organism, arms tangled, backs hunched. Their mouths were smeared with a shocking, fluorescent pink. It coated their lips, smudged their chins, clung in gritty patches to their cheeks like war paint. Their eyes were wide and unblinking, reflecting the streetlights with a flat, mineral shine.
They stopped on the sidewalk, swaying slightly. One of them let out a giggle. It was a dry, rhythmic sound—heh-heh-heh. The others joined in instantly, a percussive chorus without humor. The synchronization was absolute. They stood there giggling in perfect, hollow unison for a full ten seconds before, wordlessly, they linked arms again and shuffled away around the corner, the sound fading into the twilight.
A flake of something glittery drifted from one girl’s sweater, catching the air before settling on the damp pavement.
Margot had come to stand beside her wife. She’d seen it too. The warm light from their Tiffany lamp caught the worry in her brown eyes. “That’s… odd.”
“Odd?” Bea’s voice was a blade. “Margot. They have frosting on their faces. Grown women. And they’re not wiping it off. They’re wearing it.”
“Maybe it’s a prank. A TikTok thing. You know how weird college kids are.”
“It’s not a prank.” Bea pointed a stiff finger. “Day before yesterday, it was two girls. Yesterday, it was a book club of four. Today, it’s packs of five. They’re all leaving with that same… glaze. Like they’ve been tranquilized.”
Inside the pink-lit expanse of Sweet Peppers, Pepper Sweeting clasped her hands under her chin. “And you just felt you needed a little treat today, didn’t you?” she cooed at the two women in front of the counter.
They were in their late thirties, dressed in expensive athleisure wear. Soccer moms. One, Sarah, had a smear of glittering yellow frosting across her forehead. The other, Linda, kept touching her own throat with sticky fingers, as if marveling at the feel of her own skin.
“It’s just been so stressful,” Sarah breathed, her voice syrupy slow. “The carpool. The emails. But this… this makes it quiet.”
“It makes it pretty,” Linda corrected, her eyes fixed on Pepper’s relentless smile.
“Of course it does, my dears!” Pepper trilled. She leaned forward, her voice dropping to a intimate purr that somehow still carried across the room. “The world is so loud and so gray. You deserve a little pink. A little shine. It’s not just a cupcake. It’s an adjustment.”
She slid two more petit fours across the glass, each one oozing a honey-like substance that pulsed faintly. “A little more? For the road?”
They didn’t reach for their wallets. They just reached for the pastries, their movements languid and dreamlike. They ate without plates, standing there, letting the crumbs and ooze fall onto the pristine floor.
“You’ll tell your friends, won’t you?” Pepper said. It wasn’t a question. Her cold, calculating eyes watched the sticky paths the frosting made on their chins.
Sarah nodded, her jaw working slowly. “Everyone. I’ll tell everyone. Best bakery ever.”
“A sanctuary,” Linda echoed, licking her fingers with a thick, dragging sound.
Back across the street, Bea turned from the window, her face pale. “Did you see that? She’s feeding them right at the counter. They’re not even paying.”
“Maybe she gave them a sample,” Margot said, but the conviction was bleeding from her voice. She’d watched the women eat. Seen the vacant rapture on their faces.
“Our daughter is coming home from campus Friday,” Bea said, her voice low and tight. “She’s going to see that place. She’s going to want to try it.”
Margot’s hand went to her own throat, mirroring the gesture of the woman across the street without realizing it. “Lydia has sense. She wouldn’t…”
“Look at them, Margot!” Bea’s control snapped, her hand sweeping toward the window. “Those women have sense. Or they did. What’s in those things?”
The bell over the antique shop door jingled, a tired, tuneless sound. Both women flinched.
A young woman stood in the doorway, blinking as her eyes adjusted from the pink neon to the dim amber gloom. It was Chloe, one of the college girls from three days prior. A dusting of silver glitter clung to her sweater sleeves. A faint, rose-colored stain was still visible in the creases of her lips.
“Hi,” she said, her voice soft and distant. “Do you have… pretty things?”
Bea and Margot exchanged a glance. A long, silent conversation passed between them in the dusty air.
“We have old things,” Bea said carefully, taking a step forward. “What kind of pretty are you looking for?”
Chloe’s gaze drifted around the shop, over the stacked china, the looming furniture, the frames holding photographs of strangers. Her eyes were glassy, unfocused. “Just… pretty. Something to hold. It’s so quiet in my head now. I want something pretty to fill it.”
She took a step further in, leaving the pulsing pink glow of the street behind her. But as she moved into the light of a brass desk lamp, Bea saw it clearly: a single, tiny, almost beautiful blemish on the girl’s temple. It looked like a crystal of sugar, or a minuscule pearl, embedded just beneath the skin. It caught the light and winked.
Chloe smiled, a slow, empty stretch of her lips. “Your shop is dark. It’s better across the street. It’s sweet.”
She turned and left, the door closing gently behind her.
The silence in Holloway Antiques was thick and heavy. The scent of old wood, polish, and dust was suddenly suffocating.
Margot reached out and found Bea’s hand. Her fingers were cold. “What was on her face?”
Bea didn’t answer. She was staring out the window again, where Pepper Sweeting was now visible, silhouetted against her glowing shelves. She was waving, her exaggerated cheer clear even from a distance, as another group of women approached her door.
“We’re not letting Lydia go in there,” Bea said, the words final as a verdict.
“No,” Margot agreed, her gentle resolve finally hardening. “We’re not.”
But as they stood together in the dark, watching the pink tide build across the street, the unspoken question hung between them, cold and sharp.
How were they going to stop it?